It’s March! If you ask an educator what that means, many of them will immediately say something like, “So many days in a row without any breaks!” While the weather and spring break schedules vary depending on where you are in the world, March in many places is an “in-between” time. 

It’s not close to the fresh start at the beginning of the year, or the momentum-building sprint towards the end of the year. It’s in between. The days aren’t getting shorter, and while they are technically getting slightly longer each day as the Spring Equinox gets closer, they aren’t long days. They’re in between.

If the school year were a marathon, March is Mile 17: far enough in to be tired, and far enough away from the finish line that it can be disheartening. 

One of my key beliefs as a leader is

“Act Small for Big Results.”

In that spirit, I’m sharing an idea that can help if you need a boost at this time of year. 

In a word: brackets.

One hallmark of March (in the United States at least) is March Madness, the NCAA single elimination basketball tournament. Starting in mid-March, the tournament goes through the beginning of April and adds some excitement to spice up this in-between time.

There are lots of ways to use this seasonal speciality to spice up this time of year in any organization.

I’m sharing two resources here–one that’s very student-focused for schools, and one that’s staff-focused for anyone to use. To do any of these, you can customize the size of your bracket and get a blank bracket at the ingeniously named printyourbrackets.com.

March Mental Math Madness. This is my favorite way to use the brackets–a Mental Math Madness tournament that students compete in. This could be done in a homeroom, across a grade level, or across a school. Let’s give the most simple example: in a math class:

• The teacher should want to use this instructional time to help reinforce mental math in a way that is grade appropriate. It might be addition facts in 1st grade, or fraction simplification in 6th grade. This should be something that is not only fun, but adds instructional value, as students will get lots of practice with it.

• The teacher takes a blank bracket appropriately sized (maybe 32 participants for a homeroom–but you can also have brackets for 24 participants or varying amounts) and assigns each student to a slot. (I don’t recommend “seeding” students–instead, randomly assign students. With some sizes of bracket, not every participant competes in the first round–some get a “bye.” In situation, it could go to students who have turned in their homework consistently, or who logged the most minutes on a class math app or anything else the teacher wants to acknowledge and celebrate.)

• The teacher schedules when the “rounds” are–when do the 32 students compete, to get down to the Round of 16, then the Elite 8, then the Final Four and championship? Each “game” is about 1-2 minutes, so use that in estimating.

• Check out the sample schedule above! It can be fun to do these on Friday, or as a midweek break–whenever a little joy injected would be welcome. Also, decide what prizes may be. It could be as cool as a Mental Math Champion hoodie that all Final Four contestants get, or as simple as a dress down pass or e-gift card.

• Announcing the competition the week or two beforehand builds some excitement and hype, and it also can help the teacher stress whichever mental math skills they most want students to focus on (i.e. multiplication, division, addition, subtraction, fractions, etc.). Providing students with a practice packet or resources to use on their own, and encouraging them to get ready for the tournament, can build some academic energy. Having the bracket printed in the room is helpful to build anticipation as well as track winners.

• In each round, participants get a certain amount of time per “game” with a timer started (a great student job!). The teacher asks mental math questions appropriate for that grade level, and whichever student answers correctly first gets the point. At the end of the game, whoever has the most points for that game advances to the next round. 

• It’s also a great chance to reinforce those SEL skills: how to cheer for others, how to be a good fan (hint: not calling out answers, or booing anyone). It has some of those great behaviors sports teach–but in math! How fun is that?

• Let’s see what this looks like on a grade level: If a grade has four homerooms, their Sweet 16 contestants could all go to the grade-wide tournament. You could do this in as short a period or time, or as drawn out as you want. The larger the tournament, the more logistical considerations you’ll have (when everyone can watch a competition, etc.). There are benefits to watching too–you can have students play along and quiz themselves. At any kind of large group level, you may want to put the problems on a powerpoint so everyone can see and hearing isn’t an issue. This image below shows nine slides that were used.

• You can also apply this at the school level and have a whole school assembly to watch the championships. (The only word of caution there is to group ages appropriately so the older kids don’t dominate–we used to have 4th through 6th grades compete together, then 7th and 8th.) 

• You get to the school wide bracket similarly–if a school wants to have a 7th and 8th grade tournament, and there are four classrooms across each grade for a total of eight classrooms, the Elite 8 from each homeroom would be populated in the 64 team bracket.

• One of my proudest moments as a Founder was watching students literally fall off their chairs cheering for their teammates, on the edge of their seats like it was the NBA championships. It became a proud tradition for many years and something everyone looked forward to.

• If the math department is into this, you’re all set as a leader. Having someone take the lead on organizing, populating brackets, putting fliers up to build hype, etc. is great. Once you do it once, it’s pretty easy to rinse and repeat the following year.

Now, maybe you’re reading this and thinking “this is a lot of moving pieces. Got anything easier?” As a matter of fact, yes. One of my favorite spin instructors does a Spring Showdown every year, where he takes 16 artists and does rides where he plays both their songs. At the end of the ride, people vote on who they prefer, and the winning artist advances to the next round, until there is a Spring Showdown winner. People get really into it. (The other night, there was a Galantis versus Lincoln Park ride — people had full-on body glitter and psychedelic body suits for Team Galantis 😮.) 

You could do a bracket like this for anything and anyone, for your entire team or staff. You could do “best 80s artist” and take a simple vote for each round at the beginning of a staff meeting, going from 32 or 16 down to the champion. Your leadership team could bring in their favorite cookies and you could do stations where people try and vote, advancing them on to decide your organization’s Official Favorite Cookie of 2023. You could do Most Impactful Poet ever and have people nominate their favorites and give a 30 second pitch for them in a round, and have people vote. If you have weekly meetings, you could do a “What is the best sparkling water flavor?” and have people vote with a taste test.  It can be silly and a bit frivolous, but sometimes you need that frivolity to get through this stretch. It spices it up. 

If you want to use it strategically to drive a point home, that’s easy–pick a something you are trying to underline. Leaders can reinforce values like taking care of yourself with brackets around Best Self Care Strategy of 2023. Everyone nominates their favorites, you make a bracket and have people vote in rounds. (Maybe you have people go home and try them, or just vote on what they prefer. The message comes through loud and clear: we think self care is important at our school, and whether Team Bubble Bath triumphs over Team Meditation is irrelevant to some degree.) As leaders, you can control what goes into the brackets so nothing ridiculous makes it way in (like “quit your job” for self care) and then add this levity to some regular events to help make it a little more fun.

So, as we start this long month of uninterrupted days, where the weather can sometimes be cold and rainy, I hope this helps you inject some joy as a leader. Share this posts with any leaders you think could use a dose of joy! I’d love to hear any ideas or questions you have after reading this to use with your team! 

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